German Idealism 3/26 Kant and the Problem of Human Knowledge

Introduction to German Idealism: Lecture 3/26 Overview of Kant's Solution to the Problem of human Knowledge R.A. Veen© 2010 Metaphysics before Kant: Baumgarten: Metaphysics is the first science that contains the principles of human knowledge. logical self-reflection and knowledge of things are identical logic gives access to essential being (rationalism) Vulnerable to criticism by empiricist philosophy Metaphysics: Reflection on being qua being and as a whole Kant: Science of pure reason and its principles Reminder: Propositions can be: Synthetic aposteriori: empirical (E.g. Gold is heavy.) Analytic apriori: rational (E.g. Gold is a metal) Synthetic apriori: mathematical and physical (E.g. everything has a cause.) Human subjectivity is essentially the act of synthesis: Synthesis in experience: Syndosis: the "manifold" of experience: affect Synopsis: seen together, perception (Anschauung; space and time) Synthesis in thinking: Thinking perception (I see a white table) Predication (The table is white) Linguistic (apophantic: "The table is white") So: Perception PLUS Thought = Knowledge Apriori perception: space and time Apriori thought: categories = Forms of unity  What makes it possible that we know the nature of things without a basis in experience? How can we make strictly universal and necessary statements about the nature of reality? Copernican Revolution: Hitherto it has been assumed that all our knowledge must conform to objects. But all attempts to extend our knowledge of objects by establishing something in regard to them a priori, by means of concepts, have, on this assumption, ended in failure. We must therefore make trial whether we may not have more success in the tasks of metaphysics, if we suppose that objects must conform to our knowledge. This would agree better with what is desired, namely, that it should be possible to have knowledge of objects a priori, determining something in regard to them prior to their being given. We should then be proceeding precisely on the lines of Copernicus' primary hypothesis. (B XVI) What then is an object? Object is no longer equal to "being" (Object in that sense is Thing-in-itself) It is the correlate of an act of knowledge (Object is appearance.) The ultimate answer: The conditions of the possibility of experience in general are likewise conditions of the possibility of the objects of experience, and that for this reason they have objective validity in a synthetic a priori judgment. (B197) So: We do not produce the objects Objects are not simply given The conditions of our experience in general (logical forms, a structured perception and their synthesis in schematism and by the transcendental ego) are at the same time the basic structures of objects. EXAMPLE I think all causes have an effect Why is that true? Because causality is a logical form of unity that connects the appearance of objects in space and time (transcendental ego) and because such connections between appearances can be construed as the way these logical categories can be experienced in reality (schematism). We'll continue on Friday Friday class febr. 5th, 7 PM GMT, : Continuation of our reading of texts from the Preface of Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. Just a reminder: I will charge $20 a month for four classes starting this Friday. (Driving your care to campus costs more.) For extended tutoring and private classes I charge $40 a month. . 4